Music for Maniacs

Friday, October 26, 2018

https://wfmujungleroom.blogspot.com/or via WFMU's home page (under "Listen"): https://wfmu.org/All lowbrow all the time...uncensored audio entertainment and enlightenment for an uptight world! Featuring plenty of stuff from this here blog, including plenty of rarities recorded from vinyl (and video) - coolness not digitally available. Thanks to all the contributors over the years - your gifts to this blog now have a semi-permanent home beaming out to the world.So now you know what's I've been doing with myself lately. See y'all at the Room!

Friday, January 20, 2017

Good evening. Here's what's happening in the world of outsider music. Our top story today:- Florence Foster Jenkins, "The World's Worst Opera Singer," is not only the subject of the recent Meryl Streep film, but of two books, including one written by ma music bloggin' homie Darryl Bullock, of "World's Worst Records" fame. The other book is supposedly the one that inspired the film. Still not enough? Dig the documentary DVD.- Was quite surprised and delighted to hear Shooby Taylor the Human Horn in the recent animated film "Sing." 'Twas only a few seconds of "Stout Hearted Man" but still, Shooby's fnally hit the big time! They better include him on the soundtrack album. - All Eternal Things is a beyond-great blog dedicated to lounge private-press vinyl. The album cover pics are priceless, and the mixes and vinyl rips are hours of good bad listening.- The Everyday Film, whose recordings were once so elusive, has now thrown up everything (if you'll pardon the expression) on Bandcamp.From all of us here at M4M news, thanks for watching. Good night!

Wednesday, January 18, 2017

One of LA/s outsider music heroes David Liebe Hart and his ventriloquist dummy Chip (who he treats as his son) has a new, all-too-brief 5-song EP that takes his usual flying saucer obsessions and gives it the DJ Screw technique, (minus the Purple Drank, one assumes). Apart from odes to aliens (including one who doesn't want him to look at porn), there's also "Nature," about his experiences on 4-H Club camping trips, in which Hart delivers this memorable lyric, in his warbly baritone: "We rub sticks together to make fire/We had joy, and desire." But you'll have to buy the release to hear it, as you only get a short preview on the EP's Bandcamp page:David Liebe Hart & Chip The Black Boy getsChopped & Screwed

I've never been a major fan of the chopped 'n 'screwed sound, but the results here perfectly suit Hart's weird world. The result is sharp music shot thru with hilarious strangeness. I've already listened to this one 3 times. Pass the purple drank, please..?

Tuesday, January 10, 2017

Like a cross between cartoon soundtracks and free jazz, side 1 of this 1987 cassette-only release is a sprawling smorgasbord of countless samples and snippets of prior Rift releases mixed into a 44 minute sound-collage. Hear the album Trouser Press called: "patience-defying"! Casios, Chipmunk voices, backwards voices, video-game-like bloops 'n' bleeps, some things resembling actual rock music, and what sounds like 5 records playing at the same time...Fun stuff!

Side 2 is a found tape Zoogz claims was rescued from a garbage bin. It's a side of a polite jazzy group apparently called the Transients covering Beatles and (some fairly obscure) solo Beatle songs. That story might be more believable if the voices weren't so obviously sped-up. And then there's their, er, "cover" of "Revolution No. 9" which gives it all away. Still, judging by this set, Zoogz & Co. could have worked as a Holiday Inn lounge band. And who knows, maybe they did.

Zoogz Rift: "Son of Puke" - in 2 files, Side 1 and 2, just like a real tape.

Tuesday, December 27, 2016

It's an excellent new album from The UK's Will "Seesar" Conner and his large contingent of daemonic underlings creating Lovecraft-inspired dark ambient soundscapes, much of it created with found things on which mortal man was not meant to be making music. You might not necessarily know that from listening to this album, tho, as it's all quite musical, with each track creating its own sonic world. No random, self-indulgent banging-and-clanging here - Dr. Connor does have a PhD, after all.

The opening track is some genuinely spooky stuff - Mr. Connor shouldn't be surprised if horror film directors come a-calling. "Sirens" sets us adrift on a haunted ship lost at sea. Other tracks suggest dense rain forests, or swarms of giant insects. Way cool! Too bad this album came out after Halloween.

I asked Connor about he and the other members of his coven's use of found/invented instruments: "the re-purposed stuff is on all the tracks and that's all me, for the
most. There's bicycles, pot lids, mixing bowls, unopened 2 litre bottles
(they make great chime sounds!), bags of fertilizer (that was a less
than pleasant day at the studio for my nose...), glass jars, various
bottles, pieces of aluminum, newspaper, plastic, and much more. Arcaide
makes a lot of his own electronics, and I think Benjamin Pierce does as
well. Hell is Carbon is entirely guitars, but he used extended
techniques for all the tracks to which he contributed. I think Druha
Smrt, Babalith, and The Strange Walls (for this one track) used
primarily store-bought instruments played traditionally, but, as you can
hear, they stayed well away from standard melodic and harmonic material
for the most."

Thursday, December 22, 2016

Our pal Cat A. Waller has assembled another great batch of oddities, novelties, and cheese with a yule-time spin and I'd love to break it down for you, but Cat fears the copyright nazis, and would rather you just download this beast and check it out for yourself. Actually, a lot of it is quite old, so it's probably ok, but hey, can't be too careful nowadays. I can tell you that it's ingredients include: polka, lounge, the voice of Mr Magoo, holiday hillbillies, some helpful radio Public Service Announcements, some vintage burlesque naughtyness, a well-known indie rock band covering a song-poem, and a quite inexplicable number about a prog-rock star in his own winter wonderland. A wildly entertaining assortment that helps to make the season bright.

Thursday, December 08, 2016

To make up for my absence from blog-land*, here's about five bajillion hours of weird Christmas music. There's even a new blog called WeirdChristmas.com that has two swell podcasts so far, featuring the likes of Hasil Adkins, Tiny Tim, song-poems, and the truly horrifying Danger Woman. Hoo-yah! Pour the spiked eggnog, we got ourselves a party.

Our Central California agent-in-the-field Don-O has whipped up this HI-larious collection of Christmas Chomedy. Only 11 tracks, but classics from Albert Brooks, and the Portsmouth Sinfonia ("The World's Worst Orchestra" - featuring Brian Eno on clarinet!) sit alongside more recent gems from Stephen Colbert (one of the first things I ever downloaded from iTunes), and rad rarities that are new to me, like the one from ye olden Los Angeles radio personality "Sweet" Dick Whittington, and the gnarly surf rocker from the Go-Nuts. Oh, and speaking of L.A. radio, The Credibility Gap was a great '70s comedy show that featured Harry Shearer and Michael McKean.

Despite the back cover artwork listings, there are actually 11 tracks; not listed is a message for KMart employees, and Jon Stewart's "Message From A Jew." Don-O has also hepped us to the fact that the glory and wonder of Shittyflute now features Christmas songs. Yes! Inept flute/recorder solos (even the occasional violin) played over classic songs is a deceptively simple strategy that still makes me laff every time. Irri-tainment at it's finest. Much thanks to Don-O, whose "Hour of Crap" is happily now being archived.

It's Christmas-time, in the Shitty...And if all that wasn't enough, prepare thyself for albums and albums of kooky kids and their DIY smart-ass home-brew christmas chrap, accurately described by our new Maniac pal Quentin as The Motherlode of F'ed up Xmas music: "people at the Something Awful forums have been doing an annual Christmas album since 2009. The complete archive is on Bandcamp at

There's also supposed to be a torrent of the whole collection at
magnet:?xt=urn:btih:4DBFD6935BEB93965A4601A8B42CBE72B50947E7&dn=Goon%20Christmas%202009-2015&tr=udp%3a%2f%2ftracker.openbittorrent.com%3a80%2fannounce&tr=udp%3a%2f%2ftracker.opentrackr.org%3a1337%2fannounce
- but I haven't tried the link, as my connection has a data cap. [UPDATE: Quentin tried it, and it works.]

I actually submitted one to this year's collection, which will probably
be released shortly before Christmas - I sampled my cockatoo doing his
normal spaz when I leave the room, turned it into an SFZ instrument,
used a MIDI of "Carol of the Bells", and added some samples of my macaw
talking. The result was described as "Christmas in bird hell" in the
thread."

Wednesday, October 19, 2016

My fellow Americans! Not too crazy about any presidential candidate this year? Here's someone more entertaining then all of them put together: an ultra-conservative black man! Who can sing like a Motown star! We truly live in an age of wonders.

Lloyd starts off this 2009 release dealing, like any good politician, in generalities - stuff that anyone can get behind. He even takes a swing at Louis Armstrong's chestnut "Wonderful World." But then you get two back-to-back bits of hilarity, the somewhat baffling (and thoroughly dated) "Twenty Ten," andhis "My Girl" parody, where Marcus sings the praises of the likes of Sarah Palin and the already-forgotten Michelle Bachman. Classic. Just the thing to 'take back America' to the good ol' days of slavery, segregation,lynchings... "What a wonderfulcountry this is!"

But hey, if nothing else, he is a pretty decent singer. A patriotic round of applause for our representative from the great state of Utah, Windbag, forsending us this one.Lloyd Marcus - "American Tea Party"

Sunday, October 09, 2016

Last year, I reported on the latest sightings of sicko songsters in our society. Not only are they still at it, but some serious competition has joined them. Maniacs rejoice!

Bretts Milk "Daddy's Breath" (release date: Oct. 15) is creepy electronic "pop", like '80s New Wave gone evil. At its most subtly atmospheric, it suggests the darker side of Barnes and Barnes. Upbeat tracks resemble dance music that no-one in their right mind would ever actually dance to. Vocals, sometimes distorted, sound like the Singing Resident in need of a psychiatrist. Or an exorcist. Great fun!

That Ostrich Von Nipple album was probably my fave new release of last year, so am thrilled to hear him guesting on this equally brilliant album. Occasional guitarist for The Residents, Nolan Cook, who also appeared on Von Nipple's LP, applies his twisted 6-string shenaniganshere as well.

Perhaps an even stronger contender for album-of-the-year (so far) is Macula Dog's self-titled release. Someone on their Bandcamp page says "It's like the Residents performing covers of Oh, No!-era Devo inside the universe of Pee Wee's Playhouse," thus saving me the trouble of writing a review - I was going to compare this great band to those very same folks, including Pee Wee!

Macula Dog[listen for free, Name-Your-Price download]If your head isnt caving in yet from all this elegant eccentricity, it very well may after witnessing this stupendous 9 minute video from another avant-tarde veteran, Petunia-Liebling MacPumpkin and her Electric Phantom posse. So impressed was I by the surreal hallucinations and audio manifestations of the vid that I just had to subject Ms. MacPumpkin to a brief interrogation.

Petunia-Liebling MacPumpkin - "Veggie Medley": the vegetables will get you if you don't watch out!

- Do you do all the visual effects/photography yourself? If not, would you like to give a shout-out to your collaborators?
Melody McGinn the caretaker at Electric Phantom does the majority of the visual effects/photography/editing. In this particular story however, Jimmy L. Wright made all of the veggies, Alien and Halbert (the dog). Jodie Lowther created the "set" for part 4, and Frederick Barr the "set" for part 2.

- Where do you shoot your videos? Do you have a studio?
We shoot the videos on greenscreen at Electric Phantom.

- You are in Florida, correct? Is there any strange/experimental art/music scene near you?
Yes! From Orlando originally and now in Gibsonton. hahha I believe there is a noise scene around here, but I don't go out much.

- Do you plan on releasing this music, or is it only the soundtrack to the video?
Oh it's already been released..One more video to go and the album has been completely visualized. http://www.electric-phantom.com/merch.html

- Do you (like me) not really like vegetables, and this vid expresses your fear/guilt having been raised by your mother always trying to get you to EAT YOUR VEGETABLES?!

Actually Im a vegetarian but I had the same exact experience with meat. Maybe this is revenge.

Tuesday, September 20, 2016

Yes, I'm alive and well! This blog ain't dead yet. I've just been spending my free time on other pursuits.You don't need me to tell you who Betty Boop is. But there's more to this perennially popular cartoon character than her famous flapper look and squeaky voice exclaiming her "boop boop be doop" catchphrase. Women in the Victorian era had to endure not just social/political restrictions (no swimming allowed!), but physical ones as well. I recently saw a museum exhibit of the almost bondage-like garb of the day: tight corsets, thick layers of clothes and padding, long skirts that killed thousands of women by getting caught in machinery, wheels, etc. By the 1920s, the fun-loving young women known as "flappers" threw all that mess out the window and started jitterbugging to the new sounds of hot jazz, smoking and drinking and engaging in other such un-lady-like activities, all while wearing little more than short dresses. They had one of the first extensively chronicled slang-uages, even preceding the jazz hep-cat culture. I would wager to say that the flapper was the first hipster.The Fleischer Brothers studio wouldn't introduce Betty Boop to the silver screen until the 1930s, when the Great Depression was throwing a wet blanket over the flapper culture of the Roaring 20s. But Miss Boop kept the indomitable flapper spirit going, providing a link, via appearances by novelty jazz legend Cab Calloway, to the emerging Harlem hipster era that would come to define mid-century cool culture. In the pre-Code era, this risque, adult cartoon was often built around musical sequences, and this wonderful collection presents not just songs and musical segments from the cartoons, but even a couple of songs from Helen Kane, the original squeaky-voiced singer with the New Yawk accent that inspired the Boop character. Totally essential.A helpful Amazon reviewer notes "not all tracks are Betty herself (voiced by Mae Questel). But, many of the non-Betty tracks are from Fleischer Studios cartoons. Her “hot” theme song, sung by male vocals, began several Betty Boop cartoons... Fanny Brice singing, “I’m An Indian,” plus Maurice Chevalier’s “Hello Beautiful” from the cartoon “Betty Boop’s Rise to Fame” (1934) wherein Betty imitates those stars on those songs. That soundtrack is also included...there are two Helen Kane songs (“That’s My Weakness Now”, “Do Something”)...Cab Calloway’s two songs from “The Old Man of the Mountain” (1933) that finish this CD... I find the Fleischer versions better than Calloway’s official studio recordings for 78 rpm. The other Calloway recordings on this CD are also from Betty Boop cartoons..."Plus, you get Louis Armstrong, and Calloway's signature hit "Minnie The Moocher," a version of which was just featured in the "Forbidden Zone" soundtrack we posted recently. In the song, Calloway references "kicking the gong around," meaning smoking opium. Did I mention that "Betty Boop" was originally an adult's cartoon?

And I'm still waiting for Cyndi Lauper to fulfill her destiny by making a Betty Boop-type record...

Friday, July 29, 2016

Alex Ferris is quite obviously a genius, a 62-year-old inventor/composer who lives in the desert with his large array of giant, weird, hand-built musical instruments tuned to microtonal scales. It all sounds so impossibly obscure, esoteric, and outsider-y, but the music is beautiful. Even with it's lack of conventional instruments and standard Western "do-re-mi" scales, it's compulsively listenable. It helps that The Anarchestra (which could mean anything from Ferris solo to a large group) has a very tight rhythmic sense. His earlier pieces, performed in 4/4 time, have almost an Afro-Cuban level of funkiness. Not the sort of thing that gets play in discos, but it should.Tho these are all instrumentals, with no noisy guitars or shouted vocals, the punk influence is clear, not just in the band name, but in the economy of the compositions. There's no long intros, drawn-out endings, or endless noodling. A piece begins with most of the instruments playing at once, all locked in, then a few minutes later, it stops. All that's missing is Dee Dee Ramone shouting "1, 2, 3, 4" between each track. There's a lot of albums, but it doesn't take hours of wading thu it all to find something good. You'll know right away. And what could be more DIY than building your own instruments?

Ferris' instruments don't create too many harsh noises. Percussion, strings, winds...it's all so musical - the heir to the Harry Partch/Moondog legacy of eccentric visionaries. More recent albums have an almost meditative calm to them, but it's more "In A Silent Way"-era Miles Davis than New Age. Too much banging-and-clanging for the yoga set.I actively seek out both invented instrument and microtonal music, so I'm amazed that I haven't heard of this guy before, but he seems to have made little effort to connect to the music world, even the avant-garde scene. He has been coming aboveground lately, releasing an enormous amount of music on his Bandcamp page.It's all very consistent. From what I've heard, I'd say that you could jump in anywhere, the water's fine. I happen to be listening to the "KLEKT" album as I write this, and it's probably as good a place to start as any. Highlights include the wonderfully spooky "klekt 12," and the all-too-brief 1 minute long "klekt 7." Some tracks could be "Rain Dogs"-era Tom Waits instrumentals.Dig this 67-minute documentary:

Speaking of Harry Partch, I was amazed to read that Paul Simon is using some of Partch's instruments on his latest album. Oh great. He'll probably ruin microtonal music the way "Graceland" drove people away from the glory and wonder of African music, which sadly, to this day, still has yet to shake the hippie/urban trendy/"World Music" tag. Still, I am a little curious. Not curious to have actually listened to it yet, tho. Have any of you? Is outsider music made on homemade instruments the new NPR fad?

Here's something you most certainly will like listening to: that wonder from Down Under, Buttress O'Kneel, who's the one who hepped us to the Anarchestra in the first place. Thanks, BOK! And dig the latest release from the mistress of mad mashup madness and berserk break-core: